


A Barren Tree

by lexyhamilton (ohheichoumyheichou)



Series: How Have the Mighty Fallen [4]
Category: Christian Bible (Old Testament), תנ"ך | Tanakh
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-28
Updated: 2014-09-28
Packaged: 2018-02-19 01:58:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2370224
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohheichoumyheichou/pseuds/lexyhamilton
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set in that bright honeymooney period between D and J (after David already defeated Goliath and got instated as captain of a thousand men, but before he got married to Michal), i.e. David's 18, Jonathan is 26. The Bible says nothing about Jonathan's wife, other than that she existed and bore him a son. I liked Gladys Schmitt's idea about her being ill, but changed the circumstances to suit my fancy better. Because angst is good.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Barren Tree

**Author's Note:**

> Written in 2006, reposted from LJ, AFF.net etc  
> Blanket disclaimer on all my biblefic: this is fiction inspired by stories and characters in the Old Testament, not any sort of exegesis or legitimate interpretation.

He walked into the bedroom quietly, reverently. Mara stirred in her bed, large eyes opening.

"You march out on the campaign tomorrow?" she whispered.

"At dawn. Mephibosheth is asleep?"

“The nurse put him to bed earlier.”

Jonathan smiled, sliding onto his knees next to the bed, taking one of her pale wrists, stroking her skin, kissing her, climbing into the bed beside her. She was sickly, unable to even rise from the bed, but here in the dim light, one could hardly notice anything amiss. Jonathan's kisses crept up her arm, to her mouth, insisting but polite, stroking her body as gingerly as a soldier’s hands could muster.

"Jonathan, Beloved..." she whispered when he lay still beside her, hardly satisfied as a man should be in a marriage bed. "Jonathan, take a second wife, for my sake. It pains me to see your youth and vigor go wasted."

She heard him turn his head toward her in the darkness. "And what of your youth? Mara, my beautiful Mara, you were just a girl. Shall I take another wife to disgrace the one who has suffered to bear my fruit?"

“A barren tree should be uprooted, even if it provided fruit the previous year. Your father has taken a new wife. And Ahinoam, our revered queen, had borne him not one but five strong sons in her heyday.”

Jonathan sighed. “His example only instructs me otherwise. So much disgrace to my mother, and for what…”

Mara kissed him, resolving not to ask again, though she would not have resented a harem for such a husband as she had. Fourteen months had passed since the birth, and yet her life began to move faster since she became bed-ridden, day melting into day, the sun's revolution too rapid to notice, the Sabbaths coming and going.

Poor Mephibosheth had turned in the womb, and the birth was difficult and dangerous. Jonathan was brought in, the poor youth, looking guilty and helpless as she screamed in pain. How glad she was she did not hurl curses at her husband as she had seen others do in the flame of agony. They cut her apart far wider, Saul's court doctors, and the pain rattled her, but as the soothing tonic took effect she smiled to see the pink infant in Jonathan's arms, the two of them weeping for different causes. The wound between her legs never fully healed, never let her rise onto her own legs, nor make love in a natural way. Did she regret it? When she looked at beautiful Mephibosheth growing by the day, she thanked God for letting her bear Jonathan's royal line, and letting her live, however pain-ridden, and see the boy become a man. She thanked God for giving her Jonathan, the one man she had never known to sin. She prayed his body was satisfied elsewhere adequately, and that he did not let guilt torture his soul for it.

"Jonathan, you make a woman feel loved. How can you know how much I love you?"

"Love is not measured by how far one’s legs part."

She took him in her hand, and though she was weak and the exertion was great she persisted, soon felt his desire coat her wrist, heard Jonathan’s groan of pleasure that she had heard every night when she was young and healthy. Seed outside the body was impure and an abomination, but surely God would understand that it was a lesser evil than letting her husband lie chaste forevermore. She wiped her hand on the damp linen cloth meant for her forehead in this heat of summer.

“Beloved, I fear I need to trouble you before we retire…”

Jonathan carried her into the small adjoining room, lifting up her thin tunic, steadying her as she sat and voided water into the basin. One of his hands remained propping her up, the other stroked her thigh, wasted with disuse.

“Mara…” His voice shook slightly but his arms were steady as he laid her back in bed. “Mara, I cannot go on concealing from you, who love me so. In my selfishness I thought to spare you the knowledge, but it is not right…”

Her hand alighted on his mouth, blocking speech. “But you are in the right. Do not tell me who she is, and I will give you my blessing as blindly as Isaac. No regret or jealousy. And if she bears a child, I will embrace it as my own.”

Her hands locked around his neck, pulling him down into the bed with no strength but that of the will in her steely eyes.

“Mara…”

“Sleep… dawn approaches faster than you think, and you are to march out. Return to me and Mephibosheth safe and sound.”

Fatigue overtook guilt and Jonathan sank into dreams in his barren wife’s embrace. Before grey light he arose. She stirred awake, ever a light sleeper, kissed him, whispered parting words, watched him purify himself with ritual ablution, and put the armor on silently, not wanting to disturb his son’s sleep in the other room.

David’s gleaming smile was more visible than the rest of his visage in the pale rays of dawn.

“God brings you happiness this morning?”

“Battle at your side brings me happiness.” David embraced Jonathan, brass breastplates clanging against each other. David’s lips pursed, an obscene precursor to a kiss, but went no further, knowing the soldiers around were watching.

“Not at my side if you are to command a thousand heads. Go arrange them and allow me to do my duties as well… Captain.”

“If not on the battlefield than at your side elsewhere,” David said in a low voice.

"Get on with you." Jonathan laughed, shoving David's head in the direction of his squad.

David obeyed and went back into his section of the yard of assembly, but cast shameless lewd glances back several times-- still not quite ripe as a man, despite all his greatness and confidence. Faint desire quaking inside him, Jonathan turned to the troops and began roll-call.


End file.
